


Best Served

by hollybennett123



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: 6000 Years of Pining, Anal Sex, Blow Jobs, Domesticity, Established Relationship, Happy Wanking, Light D/s, M/M, Porn with Feelings, Post-Canon, Praise Kink, Secret Voyeurism, Switching, Tenderness, Wintertime, festive fluff, sad wanking, service top Crowley, so much wanking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-22
Updated: 2020-02-16
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:14:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21903568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hollybennett123/pseuds/hollybennett123
Summary: Crowley has called many places home, but never here.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 125
Kudos: 738
Collections: Hot Omens, South Downs Holiday-ish Exchange





	1. I

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



> For drawlight, one of the loveliest, kind-hearted and talented people I know ♥ This fic is absolutely yours in every way – I wanted to not only fulfil one of your prompt ideas (one of them getting off to the other while the other is unaware), but also work as many of your favourite things into it as possible. By happy coincidence, so many of your favourite things are my favourite things too, so it’s been a lot of fun! Part II is well on its way and will follow in the next couple of weeks. I do hope you enjoy it :)

_Soho, 2020_

If ever inclined towards any genuine contemplation on the subject of living arrangements, Crowley would conclude this: the addresses he has occupied throughout the millennia are many, and those that stand out in his memory very few. Unavoidable, really; the world moves on swiftly and Crowley shrugs and moves with it. Settles himself somewhere new — a home for now if not for long — and tries not to get too attached.

Crowley has called many places home, but never here.

For all that he and Aziraphale found somewhere to call their own in the whirlwind weeks that followed the end-of-the-world-that-wasn’t — or maybe, Crowley thinks, the cottage found them, a perfect shared vision inadvertently miracled into existence — Aziraphale’s bookshop remains exactly as it ever did, one year and two wedding rings down the line. Even if they’ve never felt the need to discuss it outright, it’s obvious Aziraphale is far too attached to even consider selling up. It serves as a more practical location to store his sizeable collection of books than the cottage’s cosy study anyway, as well as being a conveniently local spot to nip into whenever they dine out in central London.

Although the bookshop has never been Crowley’s home in the truest sense of the word, he’s always found it to have a comforting, welcoming feel ever since he first stepped through its doors. It’s been a refuge and a constant for the last two hundred years, reassuring in its stubborn refusal to keep pace with the ever-changing world beyond. The fire there took more than just Aziraphale from Crowley, and the relief he’d felt on seeing the place restored to its previous state a short time later was far more than he’d expected.

If pressed on the matter, Crowley might even admit aloud to some small degree of affection for the place. A _smidgen_ of fondness, maybe.

Just a bit.

*

The night is snow-swept and cold just as late December so often tends to be, though Crowley pays it no mind. Aziraphale’s arm is linked through his, both bundled up in coats and scarves to keep the chill at bay, and the warm glow of the bookshop beckons in the distance.

As they walk, Aziraphale recounts at length all the ways in which tonight’s dessert of cinnamon-spiced apple pie with clotted cream exceeded expectations. Crowley listens, a smile tucked at the corner of his mouth, and silently makes a promise to himself and to Aziraphale that he’ll learn to replicate the very same recipe down to the letter.

Discovering his apparent knack for baking was as much a surprise to himself as it was to Aziraphale, but a welcome one all the same. His repertoire could do with a bit of expanding, he reckons, and a good old-fashioned apple pie could do the job nicely. Besides, there’s something ancient and grounding in the scent of an apple carved open, Crowley has always felt: curls of peel between his fingers, gold flecks of juice drying on his knuckles. The thought of Aziraphale’s smile if Crowley makes it a success certainly makes it a tempting prospect.

Salt and ice crunches beneath their heels and clings to the soles of their shoes as they finally step inside the shop, melting to leave brinewater puddles that soak into the welcome mat. Crowley divests himself of his coat and scarf, deposits his glasses by the door and removes the tie from his hair, running his fingers through the long-again length of it to shake a few wayward snowflakes free.

The shop’s interior is well-heated as always and feels all the more cosy for the snowfall beginning to bank up on the window ledges outside. The Bentley, parked just beyond, is miraculously free from the weather’s effects when Crowley casts an eye over it: not his own doing tonight, and the thought of Aziraphale quietly taking care of it fills him with a warmth of a different kind.

Aziraphale had mentioned earlier that he had some work to do at the shop tonight, if that was all right with Crowley. It is, of course — time spent watching him potter about the place is never a hardship — and Crowley pours himself a whiskey and takes a seat up on the desk as Aziraphale sets about filing away a box of what he ostensibly describes as ‘stock’ but which bears a convenient resemblance to his own desired reading list for the next month or so.

Content, Crowley makes a start on his drink; swallows and savours it as it burns all the way down. From his desk-perch near the window he miracles up festive decorations and strings of twinkling lights here and there around the bookshelves with lazy flicks of his fingers just to see Aziraphale’s delighted expression whenever he happens upon another, turning to Crowley every time with the fondest of looks.

Despite Crowley’s minor distractions it doesn’t take long for Aziraphale to organise everything into its rightful place, dusting his hands off with a satisfied sigh on putting away the final book of the set. He comes to stand before Crowley with a radiant smile, plucking Crowley’s proffered glass from his hand to steal a taste for himself.

“Done yet?” Crowley asks with a grin, spreading his legs wider apart to accommodate Aziraphale between them. “Or are you going to keep me waiting, angel?”

Aziraphale regards him thoughtfully, twinkling eyes catching the light as he takes another sip of his whiskey. He blinks at Crowley in a slow, savouring-the-feeling sort of way as Crowley takes his other hand and kisses each finger in turn, lingering over the fourth as his lips brush over the wedding band he wears there.

“I was under the impression, my dear,” Aziraphale says at last, low-voiced and conspiratorial, leaning in close enough that his breath caresses Crowley’s ear and collar like a touch, “that under the proper conditions, you actually rather like being made to wait.”

It stokes the initial sparks of arousal fluttering in Crowley’s belly into something greater, Aziraphale’s tone along with the darkening intensity in his gaze boding equally well for the evening ahead of them. Good to know they’re both on the same page and all that.

“Ngk,” Crowley utters, for lack of anything more eloquent to comment on the matter.

Curling his fingers into Aziraphale’s waistcoat, Crowley hooks his heels behind Aziraphale’s thighs to keep him close; pulls him gently into a kiss, languorous and intoxicating. He tastes like whiskey and maybe just a hint of apple pie, and Crowley licks eagerly into his mouth like he’s a treat to be enjoyed.

Aziraphale allows it, albeit not for long, chuckling softly at Crowley’s enthusiasm. He brings one hand up to rest gently at Crowley’s throat, nudging his chin upwards with his thumb. Crowley yields gladly, awash with sensation as he relaxes into it and allows himself to be moved however Aziraphale pleases.

Humming softly in approval, Aziraphale brushes his thumb over Crowley’s bottom lip. He brings their mouths together again, this time holding Crowley in place as he kisses him with the kind of slow-burning intensity that makes Crowley want to offer himself up for anything, absolutely anything, Aziraphale wants to ask of him.

“Mm, I’ve been thinking,” Aziraphale says on eventually parting, his lips captivatingly kiss-reddened and slick. “Perhaps we could stay here tonight? Frightful weather out there, and it’s only getting worse. It seems rather foolish to subject ourselves to it when there’s a perfectly good bedroom upstairs.”

It’s a straightforward suggestion and yet a surprisingly novel one: not once in their time together have they ever made use of the bed in the flat over the shop. Crowley has seen the bedroom on exactly one singular occasion, and the memory of it gives him pause. Best not to dwell on it, he thinks bitterly. Nothing good can come of it, and they’re having an otherwise lovely evening.

“Sounds good to me, angel,” Crowley says, burying old memories deep and keeping Aziraphale none the wiser. “Lead the way.”

*

The bookshop’s bedroom is so fundamentally, wholeheartedly _Aziraphale_ in every way that walking over the threshold feels oddly akin to being enveloped in Aziraphale’s arms and held there, warm and safe. Despite rarely being employed for its intended purpose, instead being a room generally used for reading or occasional paperwork, the bed is large and the fabrics and furnishings clean and homely.

“Oh, you've never seen this room before, have you?” Aziraphale says brightly. “I do rather like it up here, I must say.”

Crowley freezes, feeling as though he’s choked down a mouthful of ice that settles in the pit of his stomach. In 1941, Crowley saw this room and Aziraphale inside it, and not once has he ever admitted to the fact. _Lift home_? he’d asked naively some hours beforehand, and made a series of poor errors in judgment from there on out.

His memory seems pretty set on making him relive them all now in vivid detail.

 _You could stay here, tonight. On the sofa, I mean_ , Aziraphale had stammered out that night, plumping up cushions and fiddling with various knick-knacks in the back room of the shop. _You must be awfully tired, my dear fellow, after everything._ _I have some paperwork to attend to upstairs, but this room’s all yours — it’s not a bother, I simply must insist_.

There was no reason at all for Crowley to stay, sleep being something of an optional extra as opposed to a necessity. Could’ve declined the offer regardless and been back at his own flat in no time at all. Still, weak with wanting, he’d said yes — couldn’t get the word out quick enough. The thought of leaving Aziraphale behind again so soon had gnawed at him the entire car journey back to the shop. He’d stayed, and he’d laid on the sofa in the back room, and he’d thought and he’d thought until his head ached with it.

He could convince himself, if he considered it for long enough, that perhaps Aziraphale felt exactly as he did. That he’d asked Crowley to stay with an unspoken _please stay close, I missed you terribly_ that mirrored Crowley’s own. Let his thoughts wander far enough though and he found himself dismantling that idea bit by bit. Maybe Aziraphale merely felt obligated; thought he owed Crowley a favour, probably, for turning up at the church to lend a hand.

Or maybe something else: a recognition that they’d had their differences the last time they spoke a few decades ago. An unspoken agreement that they could start afresh as something akin to friends, the gesture an olive branch of sorts.

Crowley never did like olives much.

Lying there in the darkness, it had been his hat of all things that had driven him to distraction, put up on a peg by the door with Aziraphale’s own hanging beside it. Room for two, side by side, effortlessly fitting into Aziraphale’s life and his home as if Crowley belonged there. Like he wouldn’t have to pick the damned thing up tomorrow and walk out of the door, no way of knowing whether days or weeks or years would precede their next meeting.

Some centuries ago now, Crowley had a place by the sea, a mere stone’s throw from the water at the peak of high tide. He’d spend hours walking the shoreline, salt tang in the air and the wind cold on his face, looking at the wide expanse of water and the silver glint of moonlight on the waves and wondering whether Aziraphale was looking at the very same. Would wonder where he was at that moment and whether he ever crossed Aziraphale’s mind in any significant way during the years they were inevitably dragged apart, separated by time and distance and stupid bloody _sides_ until adequate excuse was devised to ensure their paths crossed again.

Sometimes, paths crossed and arrangements bargained for, they’d inevitably end up parting with barely a goodbye. Crowley would force himself to saunter away like it was nothing even when it felt like he was carving out a piece of himself and leaving it behind, an ever-present pulse of need never quelled until he’d finally see Aziraphale again and feel like he was back where he belonged.

In 1862, Aziraphale had walked away first, furious and unwilling to listen. In 1941, seeing him again after so long an absence — his quiet gratitude and the way he’d looked at Crowley as they stood amongst the ruins of the church, the drive back to the bookshop filled with a tension Crowley couldn’t read and hours spent alone knowing Aziraphale was so near and yet so far away — it had all been a bit _much_.

Crowley hadn’t thought, when he’d gone upstairs. Was just going to check if Aziraphale was all right. See if he wanted a drink, maybe, or a hand with anything. Had never even _considered_.

“I should probably tell you something,” Crowley forces out. Aziraphale cocks his head curiously, intrigued and unconcerned as though he can’t possibly imagine Crowley having done anything untoward. It makes confessing even harder. “That night you let me stay, I came up here. Dunno why, just — needed to see you and was up the stairs before I knew it. The door was open, I didn’t realise what you were doing till I’d already seen you.”

In the end, he’d seen so _much_. Aziraphale, on the bed, having taken off his jacket and waistcoat. He’d rolled his shirtsleeves up, exposing his wrists and forearms, somehow all the more provocative for the rarity with which Crowley ever got to see the pale skin there.

He’d seen Aziraphale’s red-flushed cock, gripped hard and desperate in his hand. The elegant twist of his wrist on every firm upstroke. Committed to memory the unguarded, pleasure-struck look on Aziraphale’s face that he’d imagined so many times but never, until that moment, had opportunity to witness for himself.

“Oh my,” says Aziraphale, cheeks pink as realisation dawns.

“I, er — watched you for a bit. Couldn’t help myself,” Crowley adds, guilt sitting heavy in the hollowed-out core of him. It feels much like it did all that time ago, standing stricken with lust and lost in hopeless adoration. He can’t quite bring himself to look at him properly now. “I shouldn’t have. I’m really sorry, angel.”

Aziraphale is silent for a moment, thinking it over. His brows knit into a small frown Crowley wants to smooth away in apology. He shouldn’t have said anything — shouldn’t have done it in the first place, fucking everything up.

“I hadn’t, ah, realised you were out there, my dear,” Aziraphale says at last. “But — I know you meant no harm in it. We both were rather out of sorts that night and I shouldn’t have been so reckless in leaving the door ajar. Don’t fret; I can assure you, you’re quite forgiven.”

Crowley’s heart is in his throat. Aziraphale steps closer, placing a warm hand to Crowley’s cheek.

“M’sorry,” Crowley repeats numbly, stuck on it.

Aziraphale’s expression is soft now, as are the fingers he strokes over Crowley’s cheekbone as he gently tucks loose waves of Crowley’s hair behind his ear.

“Would you mind telling me what you were doing?” Aziraphale prompts, amused but with a touch of heat to it too. “Out there in the hallway? I’d like to know.”

Crowley swallows, his silence no doubt speaking volumes. Aziraphale tucks two fingers beneath the waistband of Crowley’s jeans, his knuckles brushing tantalisingly against his stomach and the dusting of hair there. Crowley’s breath catches in his throat.

“Were you hard for me?” Aziraphale asks. “Watching me pleasuring myself so wantonly?”

“Yeah,” Crowley says. “Fuck, course I was. Couldn’t not be.”

Aziraphale makes an approving noise, a rumble of satisfaction low in his throat.

“Did you unbutton those smart trousers of yours?” he murmurs, laying a trail of kisses across Crowley’s throat. “Take your stiff prick in your hand right there, standing where I couldn’t see you?”

“Yes,” Crowley says, flushed and mortified and totally enthralled.

Aziraphale smiles and Crowley feels it. His mouth is hot against Crowley’s neck, the brush of his lips exhilarating. He finds a tender patch of skin he knows to be Crowley’s weakness and bites down gently.

“Tease,” Crowley breathes, a compliment as opposed to a complaint. His eyes flutter closed, his body a bowstring pulled taut under Aziraphale’s clever hands.

Aziraphale hums in blithe agreement and bites down harder, smoothly palming Crowley’s cock through his jeans as he does so. Hips jumping, Crowley’s cock twitches and thickens further under Aziraphale’s hand, ever responsive to his touch. Crowley can feel how fast his own pulse is racing, an urgent throb of want that leaves him weak at the knees.

Satisfied, Aziraphale lets go, pressing a kiss over the lingering indents of his teeth and another to Crowley’s mouth. Crowley holds onto Aziraphale’s waist like a lifeline.

“You know, I did feel awfully rude that night,” Aziraphale admits, winding his arms around Crowley’s neck. “Offering you the sofa of all things, knowing full well you’d be more comfortable in the bedroom. But I simply couldn’t endure the sight of you in any bed of mine knowing I couldn’t join you in it.”

 _You could_ , Crowley thinks. _Could’ve offered and joined me there too_. Any time, any place, _anything_ — Crowley would have offered himself gladly. The timing wasn’t right, not really, but he would have regardless.

“I thought you might still be upset with me,” Crowley admits. They’ve never properly spoken of what happened that night, the church and what came after. The long stretch of empty silence in the years that came before it. “You hardly looked at me in the car, angel. Barely said a word. I know how much I’d managed to piss you off the last time we met.”

“You came to my rescue that day, despite everything,” Aziraphale says, wide-eyed and honest. “You saved my _books_ , Crowley. How could I possibly be upset with you? My heart ached for you so intently I was scared I’d say something I ought not to.”

Crowley opens his mouth and then closes it again, unsure exactly what to say. _Scared_ is rarely a word he’d associate with Aziraphale. He frets about the small things sometimes, fussing and hand-wringing, but when it comes down to it, rarely has Crowley ever known him to be truly scared of anything at all.

“Ah,” Crowley settles on eventually, soft and succinct.

Luckily for Crowley, Aziraphale never seems to mind too much when words don’t come easily. He gets up on his tiptoes for a moment and presses a kiss to Crowley’s forehead, sweet in its simplicity.

“If I may,” Aziraphale muses, looking rather pleased with himself and whatever plans he’s been quietly devising. “I have a proposition of sorts. I think it’s rather unfair, you see — all that time you spent watching me, my darling boy, and not once did I have the opportunity to see you. I’d like for you to show me how you touched yourself that night. I think that’s reasonable, don’t you?”

“Um. More than,” Crowley agrees, feeling a bit wobbly and dry-mouthed at the idea of it. That, and the rare use of _darling boy_ , two words which combined never fail to leave him in ruins. “Seems fair to me.”

It wouldn’t be the first time Aziraphale has watched him stroke himself off, something of a shared interest they’ve stumbled across before now, but this feels different: more revealing, revisiting the past and all the things Crowley had kept secret then. It’s terrifying and intense and Crowley wants it so badly he can taste it.

Aziraphale quirks an eyebrow at him and gives him an imploring nudge. Crowley can take a hint: he walks backwards, one step and then another until his knees hit the bed, sitting down abruptly onto the soft, springy mattress. Aziraphale doesn’t follow but instead calmly takes to the armchair in the corner, crossing one leg primly over the other like he’s settling in for a long-awaited show.

“You couldn’t tell me then, all the things you imagined us doing,” says Aziraphale, his tone as commanding as it is kind. “Tell me now.”

*


	2. II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for how long it took me to finish this little fic, but hopefully it's worth the wait! ♥

As tends to be the case when it comes to Aziraphale’s requests, Crowley certainly doesn’t need to be asked twice. Kicking his shoes off, he pushes himself further up the bed, angling himself to keep Aziraphale in his line of sight as he lies back to rest his head against the pillows. He wonders if he’s supposed to undress — how far and how quickly — but Aziraphale offers no instruction and Crowley assumes that will come later.

When Crowley closes his eyes for a moment, he feels just as he did all those decades ago, pulse thrumming as he stood in the shadowed hallway behind Aziraphale’s door. How different things are now, he thinks for a dizzying moment, to how they were then. In other ways, surprisingly similar. Crowley opens his eyes, and the look on Aziraphale’s face is undeniably soft.

Carefully, Crowley unbuttons his jeans, the slightest brush from his fingers enough to set his nerves alight. He draws the zip down over his straining cock and pulls it out with a sigh of relief, the vein on the underside throbbing. His palm is hot and smooth and he can’t resist giving himself a couple of strokes to take the edge off now he’s finally able to do so.

“That’s it. Lovely,” Aziraphale says appreciatively. Crowley relaxes somewhat in response, made more confident by Aziraphale’s praise; keeps slowly moving his hand over himself, teasing and light. “What was I doing?” Aziraphale asks, watching enraptured. “When you first saw me here in this room?”

“Fuck,” Crowley breathes, the things he saw that night coming back to him with startling clarity. Images he’s replayed over and over in his head ever since, ruined by them and unable to forget. “You were lying on the bed. Bit like this, I s’pose. Had your eyes closed while you stroked yourself off.” He licks a wet stripe over his palm, just as he had back then while watching from afar, and starts a steady, base-to-tip pull over his own cock that makes his hips jump needily. Has to take a moment to compose himself before he goes on. “You put your other hand up your shirt to tease yourself. Nearly discorporated me on the spot, angel, I swear.”

As if that weren’t enough, Aziraphale’s shirt had ridden up over his hips, exposing them along with a tantalising hint of his belly; glimpses of soft places usually covered by Aziraphale’s clothing that made Crowley want him all the more. Crowley groans quietly at the thought of it, squeezing his cock through the clenched grip of his fist and fluttering his thumb over the slit in a way that never fails to have him dripping all over himself.

“I see,” Aziraphale says softly. Beneath the calm exterior he seems almost shy about it in a way that’s both rare and endearing. “I can’t imagine I was particularly interesting, my dear, nor indeed very graceful about things for that matter. Had I known I had an audience, I might have taken more care.”

“Piss off, you were perfect,” Crowley says. “I hoped you were thinking about me, angel. Couldn’t know for sure. Every part of me wanted to join you in there and get you out of those hell-forsaken clothes so I could finally see you properly.” He takes a shuddering breath, fingertips tracing up the underside of his cock in an exquisite tease of sensation. “I wanted to rush it but I wouldn’t have. I would’ve undressed you slowly, if I was allowed. Taken my time, shown you — ”

“Yes?”

“Shown you I could be patient, if you wanted me to be,” he finishes quietly at Aziraphale’s prompting. “That I could be good for you.”

He doesn’t want to put words in Aziraphale’s mouth, is the thing. He would have _tried_ to be good, of course, but whether or not he is, or was, or can be, is entirely for Aziraphale to decide.

“You’re always good for me,” Aziraphale says, and Crowley has to lower his gaze just to escape the intense way Aziraphale is looking at him, feeling heated from head to toe.

Still seated in his armchair, Aziraphale keeps one leg crossed over the other, obscuring Crowley’s view of his crotch. Crowley longs to know if he’s as hard as he is himself; if Aziraphale’s cock is blood-hot and heavy and full, pressing at his fly in desperation despite his even tone.

“Did you watch me finish?” Aziraphale asks then, bringing Crowley back to himself. Aziraphale slips one of his hands between his own legs to idly massage his cock through his trousers and Crowley whimpers at the sight of him. “Did I make you come too?”

Crowley had, of course: had come right there mere inches from the door, his mouth pressed to his arm to keep himself silent and his cock pulsing guiltily into his palm. Had to keep one hand on the wall to keep his knees from buckling with the force of it, his entire body wracked with pleasure.

He was left afterwards with nothing but the mess in his hand and another in his head, a whole heap of tangled-thread feelings he had no hope of unravelling. Had cleaned himself up instead and gone silently downstairs to spend a sleepless night on the sofa.

“Yeah,” Crowley admits. “Fuck, you were gorgeous. I came so hard watching you, imagining me in there with you. Fucking you through it.”

Aziraphale makes a low, pleased sound in his throat, palming himself more keenly.

“Take your jacket and shirt off, please,” Aziraphale says, and watches unwaveringly while Crowley strips himself off from the waist up and tosses his clothes forgotten to the floor. “Thank you. Now then. It was the first time you’d seen me — seeing to myself, as it were — but not the first time, I’d imagine, that you’d pictured it. Why don’t you tell me about another?”

“Er, which one?” Crowley asks.

“Any of them,” Aziraphale says, delighted at the realisation that there are many. “Take your pick.”

Crowley casts his mind back— way, way back — and thinks of one in particular.

“I wanted you in Rome,” he admits, and it’s incredibly satisfying to say it after thousands of years have come and gone between. “I watched you eat those oysters. Watched your mouth. Your throat every time you swallowed. _Fuck_ , I wanted everything, anything you’d give me.”

“Mm. You were in a frightful mood that day,” Aziraphale says, fond. “Understandable, of course.”

“A much better one, after that. ‘Cause of you.”

“Oh?” Aziraphale says. “I’m delighted to hear it. I didn’t give you what you really wanted though, did I?”

“S’pose not. I went home, after.” _Home_ , as it was at the time, was over a thousand miles away in a windswept Caledonian town. Little place over a tavern, he’d lived in then, simple and agreeable with a roaring hearth and a comfortable bed. Rome was a strange and unfamiliar setting. He’d felt out of place, an outsider in borrowed clothes. “Got out of my things,” Crowley continues. Drags the pad of his thumb down over his frenulum, thrusting up into the loose grip of his fingers on reflex. “Stroked — _ah_ — stroked myself off till it hurt. Three times? Maybe four.”

He tightens his hold and drags his fist over his cock roughly, tugging at himself and biting back a whimper at the overload of sensation.

“Oh, you filthy thing,” Aziraphale croons. “What a vision you must have made. What did you think about? Do you remember?”

Crowley can remember it as if it were yesterday, so vivid in his mind that he can picture almost every detail.

“I wanted you to fuck my mouth. To let me show you how well I could take it. You pulled my hair. Then after, I thought about you holding me down.” His hips stutter now at the memory, an oft-revisited fantasy he’d finally experienced in reality a couple of millennia later. “Sucking me until I came down your throat, enjoying yourself. Making those _sounds_ you’d made at the restaurant.”

It wasn’t the first time he’d stroked himself to completion while thinking of Aziraphale, but never had it been so intense. He’d lain there afterwards, ruined and panting, stomach soaked wet with his own spending and knew then that this — the bone-deep ache, the longing at the heart of him that even then had already existed for eons — would never, ever wane.

“Fuck, I want to come,” Crowley sighs then, more a statement than a request, and more to himself than to Aziraphale. A simple fact. It’d be nice, is all; he isn’t _going_ to.

“Not yet, darling. When I say so,” Aziraphale says, indulgent-sounding even as he’s denying him. A gentle reminder, though Crowley hardly needs reminding. “Tell me another.”

Crowley’s mind races. There are so many to choose from, some near-forgotten, others clear in his mind. Every time they’d seen one another and sometimes when they hadn’t, because try as he might, anything and everything reminded him of Aziraphale.

After Hamlet — Aziraphale’s smile and his gratitude keeping Crowley warm that night. Or perhaps just a few short years ago, when he’d been _Nanny_ as often as he’d been _Crowley_ , one hand up under his rucked-up skirt in the bathroom when he had a few minutes to himself and had gone far too long without. Or perhaps —

“Seventeen ninety-three. The Bastille. You were _flirting_ with me,” Crowley says, fairly certain the accusation is a reasonable one.

“I was reckless, I’ll admit,” Aziraphale concedes, looking rather too smug to be considered contrite. “I was pleased to see you. You looked ever so dashing.”

“Good,” Crowley says. “S’what I was going for. For my little jaunt to _Paris_.”

“Oh?” Aziraphale says, just a hint of tartness to it despite clear attempts at nonchalance. “And who were you dressed to the nines for, exactly?”

“I was dressed up for _you_ ,” Crowley says, laughing at Aziraphale’s tone. “Don’t be daft, angel. I wasn’t there by coincidence. Knew you were in Paris and that you’d get yourself in trouble one way or another. In fact, I assumed that was the point of the whole exercise, was it not? Luring me over there just for an excuse to see me?”

“Those crepes we had were delicious,” Aziraphale says wistfully, which doesn’t answer the question but nevertheless tells Crowley everything he needs to know. “But — do you know what I was thinking as I sat across the table from you in that restaurant, Crowley? I was quite engrossed in a little fantasy of mine. I wanted nothing more than to get down on my knees to thank you _most_ enthusiastically for rescuing me.”

Crowley blinks at him. Explains a lot, really, come to think of it. Aziraphale _had_ been less chatty than usual.

“Ah. Um. Good to know.” Crowley says. At some point, he’ll have to ask Aziraphale exactly what those fantasies entailed and whether he’d done anything about them on returning home later that night, but for now the recounting of stories falls to him. “For what it’s worth, I could hardly wait to get home and get myself off,” Crowley says. “Don’t think I even bothered getting undressed. Ruined that outfit, just for you.”

Aziraphale’s hands rest on his lap now, resolutely not touching himself. Crowley pulls at his own cock, groaning softly. Dips lower, skimming over his balls and down to his hole. Aziraphale’s fingers curl and flex, fingernails digging into his thighs, all careful restraint Crowley longs to release.

“Another?” Aziraphale asks. “If you please?”

“In the park,” Crowley says, thinking of another occasion not easily forgotten. “Y’know, when I asked you for the holy water. I didn’t think you’d bugger off on account of it, but when you did — when you got angry — I didn’t want you to leave. I wanted to _feel_ it.”

“Feel what?” Aziraphale says, frowning in confusion.

It’s so easy for Crowley recall the way he’d felt that day, brimming with untold sentiments. Upset at Aziraphale’s unwillingness to listen and the way he’d sounded as he’d described their _fraternising_. Furious and lost and, of all the stupid things, aching to be fucked. Sometimes he can’t understand how humans manage it, fitting all those feelings into their tiny mortal bodies. How they cope without the occasional century-long nap to avoid having to deal with life’s mishaps and allow undue emotions to simmer down to a more manageable level.

“Your rage,” Crowley says quietly, feeling his face flush hot. For some reason this one is the hardest to admit. “Fuck. I went home, angel. Put my fingers in myself and imagined you fucking me, us taking out our frustration out on each other until we’d forgotten why we’d fought in the first place.”

“Show me,” Aziraphale says firmly, though there’s an unsteadiness to his voice that wasn’t there before. “Put your fingers in yourself now and show me how you did it.”

Crowley gets his fingers good and slick with a momentary miracle before realising he’s still dressed from the waist down, his brain too foggy with pleasure to keep up with his train of thought. He rids himself of his jeans and his socks a second later and eagerly coaxes a couple of fingers inside himself with a bitten-back moan, unbearably aroused under Aziraphale’s keen gaze.

“My thoughts that day, I confess, were similar,” Aziraphale says. “Oh, I was awfully cross with you of course, but I could never feel any anger towards you without it simply becoming an extension of my desire for you. I wanted you to know how much I cared for you and how foolish I thought you were for risking yourself like that. I would have seen to you quite thoroughly, had I the opportunity.”

Heat licks down Crowley’s spine in response to Aziraphale’s clipped tone, a struck match to kindling. He shoves his fingers deeper inside himself, whines in his throat as he curls them.

“How lovely you are, my dear. My Crowley,” Aziraphale says, the words catching thick in throat as his control wavers.

Crowley will pretend for his own sake that his resulting whimper was on account of his hand and not Aziraphale's words, the casual possession there in his voice. He looks to Aziraphale and sees him palming at himself through his trousers again, eyes hazy for a moment at the feeling of it before he focuses on Crowley again.

He gets to his feet and Crowley’s breath leaves him in a rush, stomach clenching in anticipation as Aziraphale comes to sit on the edge of the bed. Crowley comes up behind him and kisses him, the angle awkward as Aziraphale twists to meet him halfway but very enjoyable all the same.

Aziraphale fumbles to unbutton his waistcoat and makes a start on the buttons of his shirt. He doesn’t have to ask; Crowley knows where he’s supposed to be the moment Aziraphale breaks the kiss. He slinks down off the bed and onto his knees before him, looking up at him in wonder. Aziraphale forgets about undressing himself, his hands moving to touch Crowley instead.

“Are you comfortable? Don’t hurt your knees on my account,” Aziraphale says, gentle fingers lifting Crowley’s chin.

“They’re fine, angel,” Crowley tells him. “M’not bothered. I like it.”

Aziraphale gives him the dubious sort of look that says he’ll take Crowley at his word, but if there’s so much as a _hint_ of a bruise later then Aziraphale intends to fuss over him profusely. Crowley has no doubt there will be bruises, and therefore that Aziraphale will fuss over him, an altogether positive outcome in Crowley’s eyes.

“Let me help you with thessse,” Crowley says, the tips of his fingers trailing over the seam of Aziraphale’s trousers where it runs along the length of his inner thigh. Aziraphale jumps a little with a quiet gasp, oversensitive.

“Is that supposed to be helpful?” Aziraphale admonishes, eyes gleaming with mirth.

Crowley merely quirks an eyebrow at him, amused. He keeps moving, panting hotly, the tip of his nose brushing over the bulge in Aziraphale’s trousers. Aziraphale’s breath hitches, cock twitching against Crowley’s cheek when he rubs against it.

Sitting back on his heels, Crowley carefully unties the laces on Aziraphale’s shoes, slipping each of them off in turn and placing them neatly beside the bed.

“Thank you, my dear. How very kind of you,” Aziraphale says.

Crowley helps him wiggle out of his trousers and sets them aside, centring himself eagerly between Aziraphale’s parted knees. He hooks one finger into Aziraphale’s sock garters because he likes the way it feels, his finger held tight between the elastic and Aziraphale’s hot skin, and nuzzles against the now-bared skin of Aziraphale’s inner thighs.

Aziraphale’s cock is thick and heavy on his tongue when Crowley finally takes him into his mouth, sucking gently at the head before taking him deeper. He feels safe and warm as Aziraphale caresses his cheek, his whole body suffused with a constant hum of pleasure. He feels light, as if he’s floating, lost in the sensation. 

Aziraphale gathers Crowley’s long hair up with gentle fingers, sweeping it back where it falls across his face to pile upon his head instead.

“How wonderful you are at this, my dear,” Aziraphale murmurs. “Always. Your mouth is simply divine.”

 _Divine_ , he says, as if Crowley isn’t quite the opposite, his mouth and all the rest of him. Still, Crowley has far better things to be doing with his mouth than to argue, and redoubles his efforts with a stifled moan.

“Goodness,” Aziraphale says distantly.

When Aziraphale comes, he does so babbling praise as Crowley blinks up at him with imploring eyes and swallows him in gulps. Crowley lets him slip free before he’s quite done, leaving come dripping down his chin. Aziraphale looks at him with awed adoration and lets Crowley’s hair down gently where he’s still holding it, sweeping it back from Crowley’s face. He removes the come from Crowley’s chin with a precise swipe of his thumb, pushing it back inside Crowley’s mouth to suck clean.

“Let me have you once, before you see to me,” Aziraphale urges, his spit-slick cock still straining upward, apparently no less enthusiastic for having come so hard and so recently. Crowley _yearns_ to sit on it. “You’re too enticing by far.”

Crowley, already slick and open by his own fingers, doesn’t hesitate to nod his agreement. Aziraphale lies himself down on the bed and Crowley straddles him, brushing the length of his hair back over his shoulders.

Positioning Aziraphale’s cock beneath him, he sinks down onto it gradually, bit by bit. Lifts himself up and rocks against him until they’re sitting flush and then repeats the motion again.

Aziraphale captures him by the hips and pushes up inside him with a slow, aching precision that makes Crowley gasp, his cock jumping and dribbling precome in response to the persistent drag of Aziraphale’s cock over his prostate.

“Rome,” Aziraphale says, breathless. “Was that the first time you touched yourself and thought of me?”

“Hm?” Crowley says, half-distracted by his attempts to unfasten the remaining buttons on Aziraphale’s shirt. “Nope. Not then.”

In truth, they’ve never been entirely specific as to exact beginnings and when feelings beyond friendship first emerged on either side. With a hum of satisfaction, Crowley gets the last button undone and pushes Aziraphale’s shirt open. He runs his palms reverently over Aziraphale’s stomach, his soft waist; wants to gently sink his teeth into each luscious, perfect curve of his body.

“Before that?” Aziraphale says. “Goodness me. When?”

In the beginning, vivid in Crowley’s memory, there was a garden. In the garden there was Aziraphale, and in Aziraphale was some ineffable force drawing Crowley into his orbit and holding him captive there. It had taken little time at all before Crowley had yearned for, had been enthralled by, had _wanted_ ; might as well have plucked his own heart from his ribcage and handed it to Aziraphale there and then, really, gift wrapped and tied up with ribbon. _There you go_ , Crowley should have offered. _S’all yours now. No returns I'm afraid, angel._

Crowley looks into the curious blue-green of Aziraphale’s eyes and finds this confession an easy one. “Eden.”

Aziraphale shoves up into him with a sharp intake of breath, dragging him down by the hips as he does so. It sends a shuddering tremor of pleasure through Crowley’s body, a welcome earthquake. “ _Crowley_.”

“Didn’t know what I was doing. What it meant,” Crowley says when he finally remembers how to string a coherent sentence together. He braces himself on one hand, hips rocking back to meet the unrelenting thrust of Aziraphale’s cock. “Just — knew it felt good, and that I wanted to get my hands on you. For you to do the same to me.”

Aziraphale seizes Crowley along with the opportunity to roll them both over. The momentum of it has him slipping out almost entirely before he grabs beneath Crowley’s bent knee for leverage and shoves back in to the hilt.

“Darling,” Aziraphale murmurs, tucking his face to Crowley’s neck as if overwhelmed. Crowley spreads his legs wider for him like an offering, and the pistoning of Aziraphale’s hips takes on a rougher, more desperate edge. “Oh, my dear, I’m so close. Don’t finish yet, will you? I don’t want you to spill a single drop until you’re inside me.”

Crowley nods vigorously, clutching at the back of Aziraphale’s shirt. His murmured hum of agreement veers into a whine as Aziraphale changes the angle just a bit, his cockhead dragging so sweetly inside him it verges on bliss.

“Oh, aren’t you _good_ ,” Aziraphale breathes.

He thrusts deep and begins to pulse inside him moments later, murmuring _darling, darling_ , like a prayer as he does so. Come drips down Crowley’s thighs when Aziraphale’s cock slips free and Aziraphale slides his fingers through it with a satisfied little sigh, smearing it over his skin with no apparent aim in mind other than to make as much of a mess of Crowley as possible.

“Let me take these off?” Crowley asks, glancing to Aziraphale’s socks and tugging at his rumpled shirttails.

“Of course,” Aziraphale says, and Crowley has him completely naked with a snap of his fingers before Aziraphale has even finished getting the words out. “Oh, I _do_ hope you haven’t put my things somewhere I won’t be able to find them again, you impatient thing.”

“I hope I have,” Crowley smirks, pressing a kiss to Aziraphale’s smiling mouth and miracling up some more lube. “You wear clothes too often. Is it too much to ask to keep you naked all the time?”

Aziraphale smiles, eyes glittering.

“The Ritz might take offence if I turn up to our reservation tomorrow _entirely_ in the nude,” he points out. “They’re a bit of a stickler for the dress code, or so I’ve heard.”

“Boring fucks. S’their problem, not ours,” Crowley points out. “Live a little, angel.”

It makes Aziraphale laugh, which has Crowley laughing too. Aziraphale’s still chuckling to himself when Crowley carefully eases a couple of fingers inside him, his body vibrating with mirth in a way Crowley can feel from the inside out.

“Oh my,” Aziraphale says, and promptly goes quiet.

Crowley’s heart skips a beat when Aziraphale reaches for his hand, worried he’s gone too fast too soon, but instead Aziraphale clumsily grabs at him to shove his fingers in deeper, eternally greedy. Crowley has to rut against Aziraphale’s hip a little bit just to take the edge off, leaving a wet patch where he’s leaking profusely.

“Now who’s being impatient?” Crowley says.

He works Aziraphale open carefully, offering idle kisses all the while, until he has him good and ready.

“Like this, my dear?” Aziraphale suggests, turning onto his side and facing away from Crowley.

Crowley snugs up behind him, rubbing his cock against Aziraphale’s arse, sliding over his hole and making both of them moan in tandem.

“Mm?” Crowley says, waiting for Aziraphale’s approval before going any further but beyond the words to ask for it outright.

“Oh yes, just like that,” Aziraphale agrees.

It feels unreasonably good when he finally sinks inside him, slow pulses of his hips as he works himself deeper. Aziraphale’s hand finds his, fingers entwining as Crowley fucks him with shallow little thrusts.

Every bit of him is pressed up against Aziraphale, hot and perfect, and for all he can’t fuck him hard in this position, he can certainly fuck him well enough to make Aziraphale start getting progressively more vocal about it by the minute. The sheets are a rumpled mess beneath them, their skin slick with sweat by the time Aziraphale takes himself in hand and strokes himself to completion.

When Aziraphale begs for Crowley to finish inside him, Crowley can’t help himself, powerless to stop it; feels Aziraphale shiver as he shoves up into him twice, whining, lightly scraping his teeth over the nape of Aziraphale’s neck as he comes for what feels like an age.

Aziraphale turns over onto his back the moment Crowley pulls out, breathless and hair-tousled and looking thoroughly debauched.

“I want more,” Aziraphale says, tenderly touching Crowley’s cheek. “Please, my dear. Would you?”

Crowley wants to stay hard — to give Aziraphale everything he needs — and so he is, willing it into existence. He’s oversensitive when he slips back inside him, on the edge of too much and yet, at the same time, exactly what he needs.

“You’re greedy for it, angel. _Insatiable_.”

“I suppose I am, rather,” Aziraphale says, accompanying it with a satisfied little wiggle of his shoulders.

Crowley sees to him in steady strokes, rhythmic and wet like waves rolling over a shoreline. He can’t tear his eyes from Aziraphale’s face, entranced by every changing expression. The feeling of Aziraphale’s soft, strong thighs pressed up against Crowley’s hips is intoxicating, and Crowley can’t ever get enough of him.

“I want to know more,” Aziraphale says, digging his fingers into Crowley’s back to urge him to move faster. “Tell me how you wanted to have me but couldn’t, that night after the church.”

God, Satan, _someone_ , Crowley had wanted him then. Wants him now, buried inside him, always and never-ending.

“In — the — _car_ ,” Crowley grits out, punctuating each word with a thrust more ruthless than the last. The sound Aziraphale makes is devastating, his nails raking urgently over Crowley’s back and leaving white-hot streaks of pleasure in their wake. “In the backseat. Fucking you like this.”

“ _Yes_ ,” Aziraphale moans. “I — I would have said yes.” He cradles Crowley’s face between gentle palms, eyes wide and heart-wrenchingly honest. “I wouldn’t have been able to help myself that night, if you’d asked. I was there for the taking.”

The timing wasn’t right and Crowley’s glad they waited until it was, but the thought of himself then between Aziraphale’s thighs — both half-clothed and desperate and alight with nerves at the newness of it, the windows of the Bentley fogged and the seats creaking with every rough-edged thrust — makes his cock jerk and his hips stutter. He grits his teeth to come back to himself, regaining control enough to renew the rhythm.

Aziraphale winds one hand into Crowley’s hair and tugs at it, a hard pull that bares the column of Crowley’s throat and leaves him hissing through his teeth. Pleasure sparks all the way down to his cock and has him on the verge of coming, teetering so perfectly on the edge.

“Aziraphale,” Crowley murmurs brokenly. Means: _don’t, I’ll go over the edge_. Means, just as much: _please, please do that again_.

“Yes,” Aziraphale says desperately, not just pleading but _permission_ , offered in earnest as he tugs at Crowley’s hair again.

It tips Crowley over just as he thought it would, his vision white and the pleasure all-encompassing.

“Oh, _fuck_ ,” Aziraphale says softly, spilling weakly over his belly between them before Crowley’s even finished coming himself, the fourth time that night.

The sight of it and the sound of his soft-bitten whine of pleasure, the feel of him a tight-wound coil of pleasure, draws out Crowley’s own pleasure further, milking him for everything he’s got until he feels utterly spent.

Afterwards, still panting, Aziraphale pulls Crowley into him to rest his head upon his chest. Gently runs his fingers through Crowley’s hair to smooth out the tangles and cleans them both up with nothing more than a murmur before they settle down to rest in the peace and quiet of the room.

*

“You know,” Aziraphale says at length, still absent-mindedly stroking Crowley’s hair. Crowley turns curious eyes on him. “There is another reason I didn't offer this room to you all those years ago. I was rather afraid of what you might find should curiosity happen to get the better of you.”

“Oh?” Crowley says. “What d’you mean?”

For a moment, Aziraphale looks quite smitten, lost in a memory. Takes Crowley’s hand in his and squeezes before letting go. “Let me show you.”

He gently disentangles himself from Crowley and the bedding with a smile and heads over to one of the bookshelves. He’s still gorgeously, spectacularly naked, of course, and Crowley rolls over onto his front to appreciate the view.

“I know very well you’re staring at me, you scoundrel,” Aziraphale tuts, preening under Crowley’s attentions despite himself.

“Can’t help it. Have to, I’m afraid,” Crowley grins. “You’re a dream, angel. Temptation itself.”

“Oh, please,” Aziraphale scoffs, glancing back over his shoulder and looking flustered and delighted both.

Crowley watches as Aziraphale turns his attention back to the shelf in front of him and plucks a book from it, the one he’s chosen sitting centrally amongst his vast poetry collection. There’s nothing much on the leather-bound cover to indicate its contents.

Aziraphale brings it back to the bed, taking a seat alongside Crowley once again, and opens it up to reveal a hollowed-out centre Crowley isn’t expecting at all. Peering closer, he realises the topmost piece of paper within it is a handwritten letter in Aziraphale’s swirling script.

Crowley reaches for it and then pauses, glancing to Aziraphale who nods in agreement. He leafs through the thick stack of paper with careful fingers, finding more of the same all the way down. _My dearest C._ , the letters begin. Each unfailingly signed, _Yours always, A_.

Crowley glances over page after page in quick succession, glimpsing achingly honest sentences between the opening and closing lines. Aziraphale tells Crowley how much he means to him; how he misses him, wishes they could be together in all the ways he longs for, and hopes that someday things might be different. Sometimes, he writes as if he thinks Crowley’s feelings align with his own. Other letters express uncertainty that make Crowley want to beg forgiveness for ever having put doubt in his mind.

“I was afraid, of course, that they might fall into the wrong hands,” Aziraphale says, tracing one finger over the swirling shape of Crowley’s initial. “Perhaps I’ll write a few more of these someday, it could be rather fun. How splendid to finally write it out as it should be: _My dearest Crowley_.”

Only Aziraphale can make his name sound the way he does: warm and beloved, like the mere act of saying it is a treat in itself. Crowley had another name once, and can’t help but wonder sometimes if that one too could sound so cherished. It was a long time ago now, before he went and asked one too many questions: destined for great things, they'd said then, so certain they were of who he was supposed to be. Surprised and disappointed in equal measure when he failed them. _Weren't we all_ , Crowley thinks.

“I’d like that, angel,” Crowley assures him. “I’d keep every one.”

Aziraphale looks at him with quiet joy, pride and happiness in his patient gaze, and it’s hard to care overmuch about the past these days. Crowley knows whose opinion he trusts most, and he’s in this very room.

Smiling, Aziraphale extracts a small pile of letters and silently reads the first of the set. “Oh, I was feeling quite melancholy here, I think,” he says, chuckling to himself. He flicks through a few more with a wistful expression, smiling at some of the memories he finds within them before placing them back into the book. “I’m afraid most are rather on the brief side. I found writing them quite cathartic, I suppose. More a brief summation of my feelings than anything else.”

“Course,” Crowley says earnestly, “makes sense. Not like you’d have much free time with all the wanking you had to fit into your busy schedule.”

“Oh, hush, you incorrigible serpent,” Aziraphale sputters, trying and failing to contain his overspilling laughter. “You’re certainly one to talk.”

“That’s fair,” Crowley concedes. He strokes one hand down Aziraphale’s thigh and onward to trace a spiral over his ankle.

“May I read some of these to you?” Aziraphale asks. “I think it would be rather lovely, actually.”

“It would,” Crowley agrees. “I want to hear all of them, every one. But — later, angel?” He has other plans for Aziraphale’s mouth, captivating as it is. “I just want this, for now.”

Aziraphale goes easily when Crowley bears him down into the bed and kisses him, wrapping his arms around Crowley to hold him close.

A book of romantic poetry sits atop Aziraphale’s bedside table in their cottage in the South Downs; has done so from day one, a permanent fixture now. Crowley has flicked through its pages more than once, curious as to what all the fuss was about and ever keen to better understand the words and ideas that hold Aziraphale captivated.

One poem in particular had drawn Crowley’s eye every time, though he’d never been entirely sure why. He thinks maybe now he understands it just a little bit more than before.

 _my love is building a building around you_ , he remembers it saying. _Building thatandthis into Thus_ , the poem said too, _around the reckless magic of your mouth_.

Crowley thinks fondly of a cottage and also of a bookshop and, most beloved of all, here: in the space he takes up between Aziraphale’s arms, _a strong fragile house_.

Home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The poem quoted is 'My Love Is Building A Building' by E. E. Cummings :)


End file.
